vwjodyme wrote:I thought about the pro jr, but only having two knobs scares me...can you have much control over tone with 2 knobs? That's why i was also considering the vibro champ becasue it has zillions of settings that supposidly can dial in several tons of different tones for $175.

when i get into pro jr territory for 350, the blues jr is only 100 (450) more, and a used hot rod deluxe is only 30 (480) more, is there really a big difference between them? am i starting to get more than what i really need? do 15w tube amps even sound good at low volume?

Firstly, many great musicians made music with amps with only 1 knob.

Secondly, you'd likely benefit from digging in deeper on topics regarding with tubes, gain stages, volume, clean headroom and sweetspots. The Deluxe reverb won't give you good bedroom tone. It's just too loud and too big. It needs to breathe. The BJr has additional gain stages over the PJr which require more volume to open up. The Pjr, by contrast, is a super simple and sweet circuit with minimal gain stages and sounds sweet at a talking level volume.

When comparing the amps as you have above I think you should either consider new or used but not mixed. My Pjr was 200 used, I see the avg price of Bjr used being around 325 and the HRDx around 400-450.

Having owned a HRDx I'd never recommend it. If you can get away with cranking the Bjr up a bit, it is likely better for you. But I'd call that "basement volume" definately not "bedroom".

Cool, ThanksOn the new/used thing i was just looking at musicians friend and taking prices off there...prob should be checking ebay.I am new to tubes but figured they had to be in a certain volume range to start sounding good so the smaller amps would better suit my needs. Sorry for all the questions....got carried away there with the bigger amps Thanks for all your help!

vwjodyme wrote:Cool, ThanksOn the new/used thing i was just looking at musicians friend and taking prices off there...prob should be checking ebay.I am new to tubes but figured they had to be in a certain volume range to start sounding good so the smaller amps would better suit my needs. Sorry for all the questions....got carried away there with the bigger amps Thanks for all your help!

Dude, you asked smart questions, don't apologize! Just trying to help and there is so much out there on the interweb by smarter folks than I on the topics I referenced I tried to push you their way! HA!

You are in Mass, yes? Craigslist, amigo! It's the preferred method of gear acquisition, IMO

well i played a little ebay russian roulette yesterday and put a bunch of lowball bids on some pro jr's, blues jrs, champs, and gdecs, and i woke up this morning the owner of....drum roll please...a gdec jr for $80 . i think i still might be winning one other, but if i can win a small gdec and another amp (i think it was a champ) for under $200 i'll be a happy camper

I love my Gdec jr. I am going to upgrade to the new one soon enough, I am using my jr. right now as a preamp into my MC50 into a 2x12 K-110 JBL's and it is a mini Jerry rig, and a whole lot more. The problem is, as you get too loud, the modeling starts to not sound like a driven twin. Although, ironically it sounds great on its own speaker loud. Don't get me wrong, its plenty loud for what I need with some room to spare all hooked up like that through the mac. I get it about 5 and push the mac about 8 and people are hearing it outside... Good score on the Gdec its great to practice your chops on too.

I forgot to post my review of the little amp. I freakin love it! I can turn it way down to whispering levels and it still sounds awesome it has the tone i always wanted with the BF settings, and still has tons more to mess around with when I get bored. It absolutely blows my little marshall away---which i am figuring out was really only meant for heavier distortion Even my girlfriend noticed the difference right away saying she couldn't believe how much better it makes my st stephen and cryptical intros sound...and all for less than a new pedal

I finally broke down and just got a new G-dec 15. And holy crap. I have a lot to learn here. it has the SD card slot, you can record your own loops, songs, over drum beats, add in bass, to practice new scales and progressions, even perform a song. They have actual recorded band loops that come with it, I think about a hundred of them plus a bunch more to download on their site. One could actually gig with this thing in a small bar by putting an act together with this stuff. This is just plain cool and realistic. The modeling is super tweakable, and they are doing the modeling thing well, at least the Fender blackface is great. A whole bunch of stomp boxes, delay, filters of all kinds, tones, it seems like it never ends. Highly recommend the $299 for this latest version. It is better than a cyborg hooker.

-Edit: took it back and got the Gdec 30 it has a preamp out stereo on the back or adjustable line level stereo/mono. They give you $300 in recording software for free and can record your own loops and even full songs with a realistic MIDI band. The tone is so tweakable and just plain spot on with a little time with Kezar stadium show through the aux in and patience to make your tone sound exactly like Jerry's. Add a little clipping to suit, and it is done. you can even add a slight compression to simulate a tube amp blaring. As a fellow dead head buddy has told me, This thing is an overlooked gem with all the possibilities in the world.